Not Funny?
The MCFI (Mass. Con. Fandom, Inc.) put up a list of reasons of why Noreascon 4 is not like the DNC. Noreascon is the upcoming Worldcon (World Science Fiction Convention), which is being held this September in Boston.
Now that sort of endless list (70 items and counting) generally isn’t all that funny, but some Patrick Nielsen Hayden and company seem to think it’s also Not Funny. I’m not a big sci-fi fandom fan (you can tell because I call it sci-fi for clarity, rather than the fandom term sf—and I admit to being a Trekkie), but I am a Bostonian. I can attest to the fact that the list is not about Democrats, or, Ghod forbid, “expressing science fiction fandom’s traditional contempt for normal democratic politics.” It’s about the DNC logistical hell that we locals are going through at this very moment, because our city is designed around insecure cowpaths from 375 years ago.
If Patrick Nielsen Hayden says fans are generally contemptuous of democracy I’ll take his word for it, but sometimes a joke is just a joke. I don’t know a single soul on this side of I-495 who can pass up the opportunity to laugh at the latest shenanigans downtown. That’s what you bought when you voted to hold your Worldcon in Boston; please keep it in mind for next time.
If you don’t like New Englanders, there are 44 other states available.
July 26th, 2004 at 7:17 am
I’m one of the contributors to that list, though I wasn’t involved in its original creation. Speaking strictly for myself, I see no connection between “democracy” and a political elite’s holding a big party (in the non-political sense) at the expense of millions of dollars in taxpayer money and of the freedom of the city’s residents.
The difference between “sci-fi” and science fiction is easy: Asimov’s “I, Robot” is science fiction. The movie “I, Robot” is sci-fi.